A brawl and intense chaos among players on the football field completely changed the course of the game, with the referee handing out a total of 53 red cards in a single match, breaking a previous world record.
According to foreign media reports, this unusual incident took place in the first stage of the Under-20 Football Championship semi-finals in Minas Gerais, Brazil, between the teams of Uberlândia and Mamoré.
The situation got tense during the match when, at the start of the second half, a player from Uberlândia was shown a red card, prompting several team officials to storm onto the field in protest. This led to heated arguments and increased tension between the players and officials, causing the game to be halted for almost 40 minutes.
After the match resumed, Mamore scored a goal in the ninth minute of injury time to take a 3-1 lead. According to Brazilian media, Mamore’s player Davi, while celebrating the goal, provoked the opposing team’s players, which led to a large-scale fight between players of both teams.
As a result of the chaos, the referee gave red cards to a total of 43 players, 8 members of the coaching staff, and 2 officials from Uberlândia’s board. That way, 53 red cards were issued in a single match.
The match referee, Fernando Patrick Droshgk Modesto, reported that in the 54th minute of the second half, a large-scale fight broke out, making it impossible to properly follow the formal procedure for issuing red cards and ending the match.
According to the referee, due to the chaos and poor security situation, they decided to end the match. He also mentioned that a police report was filed regarding the threats they received, and after the match, the match officials’ team’s dressing room was vandalized.
Before this incident, the record for the most red cards shown in a football match was 36, set in February 2011 during a match between fifth-division Argentinian teams Atletico Cilepole and Victoriano Arenas.
In the match held in Brazil, the previous record was broken after 53 red cards were issued, and this incident became one of the extraordinary events in the history of football. Following the incident, the Uberlândia club announced that it would not participate in the second leg of the semi-final. The club described its decision as a step taken in the spirit of the game and sportsmanship.
According to the club, due to the riots, the appointed team did not have the required number of eligible players for the second leg, after which Uberlândia withdrew from the match. As a result of this decision, the appointed team advanced to the tournament final.
Uberlandia further said in their statement that proper disciplinary action has been taken at the club level against the people involved in the incident, as along with success in sports, a player’s personality and character development are also very important.
